Yippee! In honor of Poetry Month, Easter, and all things rabbity,
my free-verse picture book, To Rabbittown is now only 99 cents
oniTunes, Kindle, Nook--yippee! (Picture me jumping up and
down like an over-caffeinated kangaroo…)
Download the free Kindle for PC¬† if you don‚Äôt have an eReader.

Howdy, Campers and welcome to my 2012 Poem-A-Day Challenge!¬† Wowee–I can’t believe it’s here again!¬† This means I’ve been writing a poem a day since I took the challenge in April 2010.¬† Two. Whole. Years.¬† Over six hundred poems.

Ask any writer and I’ll bet 98% of us wonder if we deep-down really ARE writers.¬† Writing a poem a day has given me an amazing gift–I no longer doubt that I’m a writer.

This month, all the poems will be DOG POEMS, because the dog park is my new addiction.¬† So, let’s get on with the dog show–arf, arf!

You curl,
a cooked piece of pasta
on the round rug,
squeaky panda under your paw

You run,
flame on a rope,
focused, fast
chasing in the dog park

You play,
jumbo baby,
beguiling eyes,
lanky legs kicking in the air

Your whole
galumphing self
speaks loud, alive:love me!

Poetry Prompt: ¬†Alliteration, assonance and consonance are some of what Myra Cohn Livingston called the poet’s tools.

Each of these definitions and examples is from About.com:

Alliteration:¬†The¬†repetition¬†of an initial¬†consonant¬†sound, as in “a¬†peck of¬†pickled¬†peppers.”

Assonance:¬†The repetition of identical or similar¬†vowel¬†sounds in neighboring words. ¬†Example from a campaign button: I like Ike

Consonance:¬† Broadly, the repetition of¬†consonant¬†sounds; more specifically, the repetition of the final consonant sounds of accented¬†syllables¬†or important words. ¬†Example from Dylan Thomas: ¬†Do not¬†go gentle into that¬†good night.

Find examples of each in this poem.

It’s your turn.¬†Write a poem using at least one of these poet’s tools.